Through the Fog
by IoanNemos
Summary: Bombs have fallen and the lights have gone out. John follows the man with the torch. Post-apocalyptic AU in free-verse poetry.


01.  
Shaken awake, eyes open  
onto a dirty ceiling, blearily  
try to focus on the person  
waking me (that is, Sherlock)  
who is whispering urgently,  
eyes aglow with the chase,  
"We have to move now, John!  
"The game is on!"

Apparently Mycroft  
has called Sherlock on his  
cell phone, the only line  
(that I know of) this side  
of the quote wall unquote  
that still takes calls.  
Still in a haze, gear up:  
jumper, hoodie, gun, gas mask,  
first aid kit, knife, other knife,  
beef jerky, dried fruit, and we're off,  
Sherlock silent, and I  
await instruction, nerves tingling,  
brain slowly waking  
to the chill predawn air,  
and the smell of dust  
and a coming rain.

02.  
Papers no longer swirl  
through the streets, plastic  
bags huddle in flattened bunches  
in dark corners, and buildings,  
faded with grime, gape as we pass,  
doors taken off hinges,  
windows broken, contents stolen.  
Trees sway uncertainly  
in the dim light, some  
breaking through the pavement,  
no longer trimmed back  
by city employees.

No curtains or flags wave,  
all taken down for cover,  
a blanket against the cold,  
a roof to keep off the oily rain.

03.  
Cyphers haunt the streets,  
ghosts of human beings  
transformed to shadow-people,  
focused on surviving,  
bones sharp with hunger,  
voices rusty with disuse,  
eyes looking but not seeing.

These are the outcasts of  
New London;  
these are the remains of  
Old London.  
I see them and my blood  
chills, for I was almost  
one of them too.  
I glance at Sherlock  
walking ahead of me, and  
wonder again what it was he saw  
in me that made him hold  
out a hand and introduce himself.

I was an outcast of  
New London;  
he a remnant of  
Old London, his brother  
an Old London government man.

04.  
His brother had  
(and has) ties to the  
rest of the world,  
though of course contact  
is now limited to  
one single-engine airplane,  
one operator on a lonely radio,  
and one boat captain.

But these three, in their turn,  
have contacts elsewhere,  
and through them Sherlock's brother  
and his contacts and his fellow  
Old London remnants attempt  
to pick up the pieces and  
restore order.

The Queen, I believe,  
is dead.

America, I gather,  
is silent.

Israel, I understand,  
has survived another Holocaust.

Russia, China,  
Iraq, Iran,  
Canada, India,  
Brazil, Japan -  
who knows?

05.  
To the east, the clouds  
begin to lighten, and,  
through a break, the glow  
touches a match to them:  
they flame, lending to  
the grays of the world  
a highlight of crimson.

The sunrise, piercing and  
red as laser light, brushes  
the shoulder of Sherlock's  
ragged coat and leans against  
dirty, broken streetlamps,  
lending a graceful line of  
brilliant red to the arch  
of their slender arms,  
glinting along the sharp  
edges of dangling glass.

06.  
Sherlock rarely, if ever, tells  
me where we are going, or what  
we will be doing, but I am  
quite used to that now.  
Sometimes he tells me,  
but most of the time  
he doesn't, and I  
am content to  
follow him  
wherever  
he will  
lead  
me.

I  
am  
past  
where  
I dare to  
question,  
for fear he  
will send me  
away, back to  
the streets, the  
terror, the endless  
search for sustenance,  
warmth, a back against  
my own, never mind any-  
thing beyond me, or beyond  
this.

07.  
As we walk the streets,  
I keep an eye out for anyone  
approaching, an ear open  
for running footsteps,  
a scuffle, or  
a gunshot.

But the morning is still.  
There are a thousand little sounds,  
but they only add to the stillness.

I follow Sherlock,  
alert for sound,  
almost aching for sound,  
for I cannot bear the stillness.  
It rings in my ears  
and tightens around my chest  
making it hard to breathe.

08.  
The wind whistles around  
broken corners, and through  
empty tree branches and  
empty windows, brushing past us  
soft and deeply cold.  
It shuffles through the plastic  
bags, rustling them faintly,  
and moves on.

Muffled complaints moan out of broken  
doors and windows, some from  
the remains of the populace,  
some from the remains of the buildings.

The shadow-people drift about  
like ghosts of a former world,  
and the rising sun colours the world  
in distant red,  
and harsh black,  
and silent gray,  
and dry brown,  
and faint yellow,  
and faded blue,  
and dead green.

09.  
My mind's eye remembers  
the bright red of roofs,  
the clean white of walls,  
the deep green of grass,  
and the sky above a glorious,  
can't-take-it-in,  
forever-and-ever,  
subtle and fresh and deep  
like the clearest lake,  
an azure, a blue, a cerulean,  
never the same shade twice  
- or so I would swear -  
some mornings a clear ice blue,  
some afternoons a deep clean blue,  
and some evenings a breathless indigo blue.

The sky here is a tired,  
worried,  
faded,  
anxious,  
almost-but-not-quite  
blue.

I try not to remember,  
but my mind's eye  
will not stay shut.

10.  
Sherlock begins to talk  
as we walk  
through the streets,  
thinking things through,  
not needing answers,  
just needing to air the questions,  
take them apart,  
fiddle with the pieces,  
and put them together again  
in different configurations:  
that is, into statements.

He said once he needs to hear the question  
out loud  
before he can hear the answer.  
I wonder sometimes if he brings me along  
not only because I have a gun  
but also because Sherlock does not  
want to end up like the other cyphers,  
other wanderers of a world half empty,  
who meander from one place to another  
and mumble to themselves  
constantly  
- confrontations, curses, comfort, a running commentary -  
through having no one else to talk to  
that they trust will say nothing.

Even if I dared repeat what he tells me in confidence,  
who would I tell it to?  
New London cast me out.  
New London has no place for Queen's men.

Sherlock will talk to me  
and I will listen to him.  
What more do I need?

11.  
We have reached  
a building,  
perhaps an old gymnasium,  
its pale green paint peeling  
to show the concrete underneath,  
with broken windows high up  
and metal doors still on their hinges,  
too heavy to carry off.

Doubtless inside will be  
the remains of humanity,  
cyphers eking out an existence  
under an intact roof.

We could be here to question someone.  
We could be here to inform someone.  
We could be here to recruit someone.  
We could be here to kill someone.  
I don't know.  
Sherlock doesn't tell me.  
I don't ask.

12.  
The weight of my gun  
is comforting  
in my hand.  
It is like  
an extension of  
my arm.

Sherlock consults  
his phone, and then  
decisively puts it  
back in his pocket.  
He approaches the door,  
his eyes glittering.

Sherlock's left hand swings back  
to keep me away from the door  
until he knows if I'm needed  
at this point,  
but if he does need me, I'm ready  
whenever he is.

My heart rate rises,  
and adrenaline shoots  
through my bloodstream  
as Sherlock's right hand  
closes firmly  
around the doorknob  
and turns it.

A/N  
This was inspired by a piece of artwork I found on deviantART. There's a link on my profile to the picture.

There might possibly be more poems coming - I wrote a story in prose (also based on the picture) that I'm thinking about rewriting in free-verse poetry.

R/R  
~~~


End file.
